10 seconds to Knock Out
by Every Dog Has Its Day
Summary: One. Two. Three. Four...the punches are echoes, and the memories worse than the pain on dry knuckles. But there is time for breath between hits, for respite, for...8059


One

**10 seconds to Knock Out**

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.

The sound echoes through the closed air inside the empty gym, punch after punch after punch, the dry and muffled sound of the bag being hit creating a sort of strange, off-beat music that dances in the dim grey-blue light, like a world without colours. My knuckles are burning, they slip over the hard material because of the blood, some already dried, some fresh. One, two, three, four, five, six, twenty seven. Twenty-fucking-seven. I cling onto the bag as I bend over, coughing another cigarette to the floor. I'm like some stupid animal, trying to breathe while smoking, getting death instead of oxygen in my body. I step on the new addition, seems like there's a hundred down there, under my feet, beside the corpses, the whispering ghost in my head. I let out another scream, which sounds raspier than it should. The cigars are finally eating away my voice, creatures of smoke and tar.

I star all over again, crying out louder with each bloody, painful, anger and regret-filled punch, _onetwothreefourfivesixseven._

I turn my head with wild eyes as I hear a sound, coming from behind lawn-head's boxing ring, one step, two steps, three steps, resounding and echoing and crashing sound all over me, around me, in my head. For a moment, one of those stupid moments that makes me more human than I'd like to be, I expect to see brown hair, large eyes smiling up at me. But no, it's only black, black and brown and mocking scar and where did that awfully stupid smile go?

''You really should stop doing that,'' he says, looking fucking worried, no more games for him, for me, for anyone.

''What the fuck do you care, baseball idiot?'' I spit out, lighting up another cigarette, the smoke momentarily making Yamamoto disappear as I exhale, watching the grey swirls as a far away piano echoes in my mind.

He doesn't answer, just gets closer, painfully closer. I look into his eyes through the smoke, the music suddenly silenced in my head, just the echoes remaining. They're brown, dark brown, almost black in the quiet grey-blue that covers everything. I try to hold his gaze but can't, it's always scared the shit out of me to do that, afraid of what I might or might not see. He takes a step forward and I watch as he lifts his hand up to me, all the expression gone from his face, concentrating in his eyes. He places his fingers on my cigarette, lingering for less than a second on my lips and takes it away from my mouth. I open it to protest but the words die away in my throat as he puts the damned thing between his lips, taking a long, deep, professional drag, closing his eyes as the smoke enters his lungs. When he opens them again he must see my startled expression because the edge of a smile appears as he says,

"I thought that it might help," _with everything, with coping, with pain_. "Since you do it so much...it doesn't taste very good though.'' His voice is low, still with that sort of blank expression, the shreds of light brown in his eyes catching the shadows in the room, making them deeper, deeper.

''Idiot,'' is the only thing I can come up with, taking the cigar back and giving it a last long drag before throwing it to the floor, trying not to think something stupid, like just how fucking _sexy_ Yamamoto looked with that cigarette in his hands.

Yamamoto turns back and heads for lawn-head's boxing ring, getting in through the surrounding chords, looking back at me with another smile, this time the dangerous one.

''Want to spar a little?'' he asks, looking down at me, daring me with his dark eyes to go and try to beat the crap out of him. I sigh and walk over to him, getting in the ring and throwing him a warning glance. He knows what's coming though. That I don't go easy. Not anymore, to anyone.

I take my jacket off, letting it slide down my arms, followed by my already loosened tie, shirt and shoes, which I throw outside the ring in a messy bundle. I try not to look as Yamamoto does the same, focusing instead on his eyes, giving him my best deathly glare because honestly, I'm not in the mood to even smirk. I lift my fists to my face, crouching slightly and suddenly I'm dodging a well aimed punch at my face, striking back at him with all my might, catching him right in the chest and it fucking pisses me off because I know he let me do that.

''Is that all you can do, you fucking pussy?'' I spit at him through our dance of feet and fists, feeling the cold floor under my bare feet as I move around him, throwing another punch at his face and this time he blocks it with his forearm, giving me his deadliest smile as he punches me right in the stomach, knocking the breath out of me yet I can still aim another punch that hits the side of his face. He takes it with another fucking smile and smashes me into the corner, a hiss coming out of my mouth when the pole collides with my back and suddenly his face is too close for my liking.

''You have too much anger in you, Gokudera,'' he whispers and I punch him hard in the stomach, pushing him away from me with another punch to his side and I almost smile when he gasps out in pain.

''Fuck you,'' I hiss at him, blocking a punch to my face and receiving one in my left arm which I know is going to leave an ugly bruise tomorrow.

''Tsuna wouldn't have wanted that,'' he says_. _I stumble for a second, a restraint in my mind shredding, breaking, collapsing.I let out all the raging madness, all the desperation and pain at having lost the most important person in my life and I punch him straight in the face, feeling the warm blood on my fist.

''You fucking bastard, don't tell me what he wants or doesn't because it doesn't fucking matter anymore, he's _dead!''_ I scream the last word, a sharp stab of reality to both of us. I stand panting, looking down at him as he wipes the blood off his face, all trace of a smile gone from his face.

''I'm sorry, Gokudera. But there really wasn't anything we could do,'' he says. The fucking doctor, the martyr. Dodges another punch to his face, standing up and looking at me with sad eyes.

''Yes we could have fucking done something!'' I say and we're dancing again, fighting out all of our bottled up feelings because we both known that there's an emptiness all around us. One punch, two, three four, I don't even know now how many times he's hit me or I've hit him.

''I could've gone with him, fuck it! I should be dead instead of him!'' I shout at him between furious punches that my mind can't even register anymore because everything it's just so fucking crazy.

''He didn't let us go with him for a reason. This is Tsuna we're talking about, Tsuna, Tsuna, as much as it fucking hurts," he cusses, the word thin and angry, odd in his voice as he throws a punch at my neck that hurts like a bitch. "We can't do anything about it, not even you, his loyal right-hand man,'' he says, cruelly? Realistically, dodging and aiming and hitting in this madness that we've created, our bodies now glistening with sweat and _fuck _I need a smoke.

''Fucking right hand-man my ass. I failed- it was my duty, I should have- I should have died with him!'' I spit out and suddenly I don't know where I am.

I open my eyes and see Yamamoto's face, his hands pinning me to the floor, the force of the wild punch having thrown me to the floor. I look defiantly into his eyes, which are filled with anger and something I really don't want to figure out because I'm not fucking ready for it yet.

''Don't you ever, _ever_ say that again, Hayato,'' he hisses, whispers, screams, and all comebacks die in my mind, because I've never heard him call my name like that, his voice so low and raspy and angry and fucking christ it's driving me crazy, the way those words dig under my skin, under my mind, spinning insanity through me. I'm suddenly and painfully aware of our position, me pinned to the floor, his hands burning my wrists, his legs on each side of me and I can't breathe anymore, I can't stop looking at him and remembering how he looked with a cigar in his mouth, the hard muscles covered in sweat.

''Why do you fucking ca-'' I start saying but I'm cut off by his mouth, teeth biting down hard on my lower lip and then sucking on it.

''I care,'' he says, simply, looking at me with his coffee-bitter eyes as they seem to grow darker. Our mouths meet again, teeth clashing, and I suck his tongue into my mouth, burying my fingers in his short, black hair, earning a growl from him. His nails are digging in my side and his mouth trails down to my throat, somehow removing my shirt in the process, sucking hard and licking and biting while he slightly rubs his thighs on mine and suddenly I can't fucking take it anymore. I roll us over, ignoring Yamamoto's exasperated gasp as straddle him and then lean down to fuck his mouth with my tongue, my hands trailing down to his chest, ripping his button-up shirt open, this time earning a small laugh against my lips.

''What the fuck's so funny, baseball freak?'' I growl, biting one of his nipples and smirking with satisfaction as he moans, fingers pulling at my hair, his answer lost somewhere in his head. I lick my way down, unbuckling his belt and pulling his pants down just a little bit, so I can suck on the dip of his hip, feeling his hard-on against my neck. I slowly unzip his pants and breathe on his boxers, gasping as his moan rings out through the empty gym, echoing into the darkness.

''...to...haya...to'' he says my name between breaths, practically shouting out as I take him into my mouth once his pants and boxers have been shoved to his ankles and then off, off. Before I know it he's thrusting violently into my mouth, his fingers digging painfully on my head but it only makes it better, creating a sort of rythm with his thrusts and moans.

''Do you like that?'' I ask him with a low voice, looking up at him from between his legs. He doesn't spare a moment to reply, yanking my head up and then it's me who's pinned to the floor, hips arched up as he cups my erection _hard. _His lips brush my ear and I feel like bursting to flames when he whispers,

''_I'm going to fuck you_'', while his hand gets under my pants and pulls at my erection. I unconsciously dig my fingers into his bare shoulders as he takes my pants off, going back down and taking me in his mouth just like I had done not even a minute ago. However, it doesn't last long and his mouth is on mine again, salty, his knees digging on the floor ans suddenly his fingers are in me, causing me to wince at the pain.

''Fucking watch it,'' I hiss at him and I almost come at the smile he gives me, sexiest smirk I've ever seen in my whole fucking life. He removes the ofending fingers after a bit of more lip-sucking and places hismelf at my entrance, grabbing my wrists and pinning them to the floor, keeping me in place with his whole body as he pushes in, silencing my growl with his mouth, the slice of pain lost inside him. He starts moving way too slowly for my liking but I can't bring myself to move at the ache until it's too much, used to the feeling, wanting more, more. I thrust up against him and soon we find our rythm, another mad dance of pleasure and moans that shiver up reality, as if all the pain never existed.

''_Takeshi!!''_ I cry out without noticing as he grabs my leg and swings it over his shoulder, thrusting even deeper and I can't take it anymore, I come between our stomachs with a last cry and he soon follows, slumping against me as we both try to recover our breaths. He slides out and moves a bit to the side, with his old stupid grin and fuck it I've missed seeing it, even if I'll never admit it out loud. He closes his eyes and sighs, forgetting just where we are and I let myself do the same, pushing back the pang of hurt as I remember soft brown hair and large eyes, smiling up at me.

''Did you ever do this with him?'' Yamamoto asks softly, eyes now open and searching mine, having read my mind.

''Of course not, you idiot...it was a different kind of love than this,'' I whisper, looking up at the grey ceiling.

''You just said you love me, just not like you loved Tsuna,'' he says with the giant grin and he laughs as I punch him in the arm, muttering about how much of an idiot he is.

I find my clothes lazily and order him to clean up the mess, lighting a cigar and ignoring his happy thumbs-up as he lays there in the boxing ring, right in the evidence.

No one was going to have the same love from me as Tsuna had, but it didn't mean I couldn't learn how to love in a different way. Even if it was for that good for nothing idiot.

OoOoOo

''Hey, Gokudera!'' I hear a voice call me in the hallway of the vongola headquarters. I turn back and see Ryohei walking in his very fast, _extreme_ way at me.

''Yeah?'' I answer, moving my cigarette from one corner of my mouth to the other.

''I heard you used the grym yesterday! It's good you have decided to devote yourself to the wonderful sport that is boxing! Altough, that was some work out you had in the ring, it was dirty TO THE EXTREME.''

To hell with love. Yamamoto was going to die NOW.


End file.
